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Cyber Shopkeeper
Amrit Man Tuladhar
On June 3, 2005 Kiran Aryal, a resident of Dillibazar received a cake at his doorstep. The day was his 54 th birthday and the cake was a wonderful surprise from his daughter, Kripa, who resides continents away, in Virginia-USA.
Hundreds of people like Aryal receive gifts and flowers in Nepal during times of celebration, happiness and sometimes in sorrow from their near and dear ones living abroad. But more important than the gift is a thoughtful message. This has been possible in Nepal because of one man, Amrit Man Tuladhar. He thought it could be a viable business here to link these people via the internet. His muncha.com is almost a generic name in the online shopping business though a number of other similar shops have been in operation for some time.
Tuladhar, 34, prefers to call himself an online shopping entrepreneur. As we speak, he shows us his research folders and says that he conducts continuous research on the internet to make new developments in his venture.
Tuladhar did his schooling from St. Xavier’s School in Kathmandu. In 1993, he completed his Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Berea College, Kentucky and his Master’s degree in Business Administration from Marshall University, Huntington, West Virginia. After six years in the United States, he came back to Nepal with a determination to do something in his homeland.
As the banking sector was appealing to him at that time, he joined the Himalayan Bank, New Road Branch as a Credit Officer in October 1995, and he was soon promoted to the post of the Credit Manager. Later, he started working as the Assistant Manager of Customer Relation Department (CRD) in the bank’s Head Office. It would have been enough as an achievement for anyone at his age. However, it was not so for him. His job at the bank soon became a tedious routine for innovative Tuladhar who craved for freshness and challenges. So, he left his prosperous and high profile profession as a banker after four years to start something on his own in the untrodden path of e-commerce. That’s when munchahouse.com (now muncha.com) was born.
The Origin of a Brand Name
He recalls, “As far as I can remember my family has always been in retail business.” Almost 60 years ago, when Ason was the main business hub in Kathmandu, there was a retail shop called Motiman Ratnaman run by his great grandfathers. At one point of time, Manik Man, a relative, managed the shop. The Newari locals started calling the shop Mancha’s which later became Muncha’s. A signboard, which read “Muncha House”, was also installed and it soon became a household name in the town and it is still as popular as it was then. In fact it could be considered as a sort of the first departmental store of Nepal. Wanting to broaden the family business into newer pastures, Amrit decided to take Muncha House online, using the knowledge about online business he had gathered out of curiosity while he was in the States.
Making History – www.munchahouse.com
Tuladhar’s dream business started in May 2000 as munchahouse.com in one small room in Teku with two computers, three staff and the office furnished with a dining table and chairs from his home and second hand racks purchased at an auction. It was mainly a gift site, which featured items available in the retail store of the family along with some cakes and flower bouquets. He started the business with a lot of uncertainty because such businesses were totally unexplored in Nepal. In the beginning, munchahouse.com used to receive only one order in four days. But Tuladhar was optimistic. “We could have closed down in one year with that sort of business volume, but we stuck to it because we believed that gateways would open up soon”, he says.
He focused on laying the infrastructure for the e-business. Whatever he earned, he invested back into the business, particularly in making the site more appealing to the customers. Today his website is regarded as one of the simplest and most user-friendly e-commerce sites in Nepal. Speedily expanding the range of items, munchahouse.com soon prevailed in the market competition. In early 2004, the site name was shortened to muncha.com making it further easier for the customers.
www.muncha.com – The Local Market Venture
Muncha.com operates with six departments—Programming Department, Operation and Marketing Department, Customer Service Department, Packaging and Inventory Department, Delivery Department and Accounts Department from the office now based in New Road. Currently, there is 11 staff including Amrit. So, it has helped him to maintain a good rapport with all the staff. Earlier, it was taking orders only from abroad, but now also local Nepalis can place their orders.
Today, muncha.com is a reliable online departmental store dealing in items ranging from flower bouquets to motorcycles and from sweets to washing machines. More than 7,000 items are featured on muncha.com and it delivers orders to over 120 destinations in Nepal. The payment procedures available are by credit card or by cash payment on delivery; the latter is more popular in case of orders from within the country.
But muncha.com is not limited to that. Photo Centre and Portrait Painting are some of the other services they provide through muncha.com. Now with their solid customer base of 8,000 people who live outside Nepal, they have also started Money Transfer services and selling Calling Cards through muncha.com.
Today muncha.com receives about 400 orders per month making it a flourishing business. But Tuladhar is not hoping for profit right now. “I know we are not going to make money for the next ten years, as we have been investing whatever we are earning in the operations and research,” he says. Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Dasain, Tihar and Valentine’s Day are some occasions when they receive a large number of orders from countries like the USA, UK, Australia, Singapore, Japan, and Ireland.
The Family Man
As for his personal life, Tuladhar says, “My social life has become very haphazard due to my business.” Although he is able to spend time with his family and also indulge in his various interests, his timing has been very irregular. He is fond of watching movies while his other interests include photography and playing with electronic gadgets. “No matter how busy I am, I make sure that I give attention to my wife and daughters and spend a lot of quality time with them even though it’s just confined to the everyday drive to their schools and back,” he says and is very appreciative of his wife. “My wife has been a major source of support in my life,” he notes. A casual dresser, you will mostly see him in his khakis and t-shirts.
The Future - Reason to Believe
According to Tuladhar, the start of the Cyber Law is the first step, which indicates that e-business will be recognised and protected in Nepal. Also the local market venture has shown a good scope. “But for that you should know what sells and have a good sense of direction,” he advice for those who would like to start a similar venture.
Tuladhar is a development-oriented leader who values experimentation, seeks new ideas, and generates and implements change. He’s very confident that e-commerce will prosper tremendously in the next two to three years and when it happens, he believes, muncha.com will still be the number one online shopping website in Nepal. The biggest challenge in his business is that people perceive the goods sold through the internet as expensive. He does agree that it was expensive in the beginning as volumes were low and infrastructural costs were high. However, that is not the case any more. He informs that 99 percent of the goods sold through muncha.com are priced at market rates. According to him, muncha.com is the only online shopping company in Nepal, which is making a conscious effort to keep the prices comparable.
According to him, online shopping is just a small part of what the internet can be used for – and muncha.com, which is only dealing with online shopping, is just at the tip of the iceberg. Especially for a country like Nepal, the internet is a boon. However, a lot of work needs to be put into infrastructural development, which is not just limited to internet infrastructure, but also extends to educate the population.
By Parakram Singh Yonjan
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